Mulch can help protect and nurture soil and plants, but sometimes you can have too much of a good thing, as one onlooker discovered.
While traveling through a neighborhood, they spotted a tree with a mountain of mulch surrounding it on the side of someone's home. They were stumped by the find, to say the least.
"Found in the wild today," they wrote above the photos uploaded to the r/arborists subreddit.
"Wild is right," someone commented.
"Yes I'm still not tracking the logic as to why they lifted it that high nor why they just left all the mulch piled against it," the original poster replied.
The OP stumbled upon an unfortunately common landscaping technique known as volcano mulching. Not only is it bad news for people's wallets, since buying that much mulch is a waste of money, but it also can be a death sentence for trees.
Some gardeners think volcano mulching adds curb appeal, but it will eventually have the opposite effect since it can cause girdling or tree asphyxiation. This condition is caused by a tree being suffocated by its own roots because they wrap themselves tightly around the tree's base to suck up nutrients from the mulch. Ultimately, the tree is left with no remaining nutrients and dies.
Furthermore, volcano mulching can result in poor health of roots, tree rot, rodent infestations, and other issues caused by excess moisture in the mulch. If this practice is repeated on many trees in an ecosystem, it could lead to widespread issues in the local environment.
According to Kingstowne Lawn & Landscape, the proper mulching method is to form a "donut" around the base of a tree, with no mulch piled directly against it. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln agriculture department explained that laying down a two- to three-inch layer of mulch starting about two inches from the tree is the best practice.
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After adding a healthy amount of mulch to your trees, you could use native plants to turn your lawn into a biodiverse paradise that will attract pollinators and save you money on landscaping. Native plants such as clover and buffalo grass, in particular, are easy ways to transform your lawn without breaking the bank, and you'll save tons of water in the process.
As for the mulch mishap, commenters were shocked by the bizarre sight.
"Oeeph.. that's a lot of mulching! Seems temporary (hopefully), but is never really a good thing. I sure hope that mulch is old, as fresh chipped mulch will produce a lot of heat," one person said.
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